He hoped that the sisters might have taken themselves off somewhere, but Nessie answered the door to him with a sharp “What now?”
“Mr. Blair wishes me to ask you some more questions.”
“Come ben. I suppose you’ll want tea.”
“No, thank you.”
“Nonsense, you always want tea. Aren’t we always saying in the village that Hamish Macbeth wouldn’t pay for a cup of tea if he could get one free? Sit down!”
“I don’t want tea,” snarled Hamish, but Nessie was already in the kitchen, and he could hear her talking to her sister.
“Put the kettle on, Jessie. Thon Hamish Macbeth is here, looking for free cups of tea as usual. His superior has told him to ask us some more questions, and does Macbeth stand up to him? No. Spineless.”
“Spineless,” echoed her sister.
Hamish sat with his face flaming red with irritation.
The sisters eventually bustled in with a loaded tray. “Here’s your tea,” said Jessie, “your tea.”
Hamish placed his cup on one of those pieces of furniture called an occasional table, and took out his notebook.
“Our alibi checked out,” said Nessie before he could open his mouth, “so there is no use you wasting your time going over that again.”
“I was going to ask you if either of you or both of you called on John Heppel before you went to Strathbane.”
Hamish had simply asked that question out of irritation. He did not think for a minute they had, but Jessie’s teacup rattled in its saucer and she shot a quick glance at her sister, who said, “We were in Strathbane and you are wasting time.”
“Wasting time,” murmured Jessie.
Hamish studied the two faces. Their eyes behind their thick glasses were blank.
“Wind’s back again,” said Nessie as the window panes rattled.
“You were at John’s cottage,” said Hamish. “You see, I know you were.”
“She said she wouldnae say anything,” cried Nessie.
Another thought leapt into Hamish’s mind. He remembered he had thought Freda was holding back something, and he had assumed that something was Callum’s visit.
“Freda, the schoolteacher,” said Hamish. “You’d better tell me about your visit.”
“It was nothing,” said Nessie. “We wanted our money back, so we drove up to his cottage.”
“Why didn’t you drive to Strathbane?” asked Hamish, momentarily diverted.
“It’s too far. It’s better to take the bus. So we saw that John Heppel, and he was very rude. He said he had given us his valuable time and he wasn’t giving any money back. Then young Angus said…”
She put her hand over her mouth.
“Out with it!” ordered Hamish. “Just how many of you went up there? I’ll find out, you know.”
“It was at four in the afternoon. Oh, you may as well know. There was us and Angus Petrie, Mrs. Wellington, and Archie Maclean.”
“Dear God, ladies. Do you know the trouble you’ll all be in when Blair gets to hear of this?”
“Have a scone, a scone,” said Jessie eagerly.
Irritated, Hamish was about to shout that he did not want a scone, but the one held out to him on a plate looked feathery light and was laden with butter and what appeared to be home-made strawberry jam.
He took the plate.
“You see,” said Nessie eagerly, “that bullying fat man need never know. None of us would tell him.”
“I can’t be keeping information like that out of my report!”
They watched him as he bit into the scone.
“You wouldn’t have known if thon Freda had kept her mouth shut,” said Nessie.
Hamish finished the scone. “She didn’t say anything,” he confessed. “It was just a lucky guess.”
“So there you are!” exclaimed Nessie triumphantly. “We were all up there long afore he was killed. Have another scone.”
♦
Hamish left a quarter of an hour later, full of scones and guilt. He had made a rash promise to keep quiet about their visit unless Blair or any policeman found out. Then he would need to put in a report, and fast.
He made his way up to the manse. Mrs. Wellington answered the door and said quickly, “I’m too busy.”
“Why didn’t you tell me you’d seen John Heppel the day he was murdered?”
Mrs. Wellington flushed red. “You’d better come in.”
Hamish followed her into the large manse kitchen, a relic of the days when ministers had large families. A huge scarred wooden dresser took up one wall, and along another wall was the old coal-fired range, never used now for cooking but only for heating the room. A gas cooker was against the third wall beside two enormous porcelain sinks.
Hamish wondered suddenly if the Wellingtons minded being childless. But then, he reflected, he could never imagine the Wellingtons doing what was necessary to make a child. He could not imagine Mrs. Wellington out of her tweeds. He sometimes wondered madly if she wore a tweed nightgown.
“Sit down,” she barked militantly as if trying to regain her dignity.
Hamish took off his cap and sat down at the kitchen table.
“I didn’t report it,” she said, “or Mr. Blair would have arrested me. I mean, look what happened to Alistair Taggart.”
“I sympathise with you,” said Hamish. “I don’t think I can keep it quiet very long. You should know that these things come out sooner or later. He wouldn’t have arrested all of you. You were all there before Heppel was murdered, so what was the harm in telling the police? Oh, well, the damage is done. Now, I want you to think hard. I know you were all very angry. But imagine you’re back there. He wouldn’t let you in his house. Do you think there was anyone else in there?”
Mrs. Wellington sat very still. “There might have been. He stood with the door just open a little so we couldn’t see past him.”
“And how was he? Could he have been frightened?”
“Hard to tell. He was flustered and angry. He shouted a lot of nonsense that he was a celebrity who had given us his valuable time. Angus Petrie made a dash for the door and he slammed it shut. Archie Maclean kicked the door and shouted. Then we went away.”
“What did Archie shout?”
Her head went down and she avoided his eyes. “I can’t remember.”
“I’ll be asking Archie myself. Now, as you walked away, were you aware of any other vehicle there?”
She shook her head.
“Did you pass anyone on the road?”
“Not on the road to his house, not on the track. No one for a bit and then a grey van.”
“What make?”
“I think it was one of those little old Ford vans.”
“Light grey? Dark grey?”
“Sort of light grey and dirty.”
“Any markings? Anything written on the side?”
“No. But I wasn’t paying any particular attention.”
“You wouldn’t happen to have remembered any number plate? Even a letter?”
“No, I’m sorry.”
“And where exactly did you pass this van?”
“Just before we got to Cnothan.”
“They were all in your car?”
“Yes.”
“I’d better go and see Angus Petrie and see what he has to say. If you remember anything else, phone me.”
♦
Hamish collected Lugs and drove over to the forest on the other side of the loch. He went to the forestry office and asked for Angus.
“He’s up the hill a bit,” said the manager. “You can take that Land Rover of yours straight up the track. I hope the lad’s not in any trouble. He’s a good worker.”
“Just routine enquiries.”
Hamish went out and got into the Land Rover and drove up a broad track between the pine trees, which were beginning to bend in the rising wind.
At the top of the track he stopped where a group of men were sitting drinking tea, Angus amongst them.
Hamish climbed down from the Land Rover and went round to the passenger side and lifted Lugs down. The dog ran off through the trees.